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“Hitting it off with the retirees, are we?”
“When she found out I was a doctor, she had me look at a mole on her hip.”
“Wait, she showed it to you in the coffee shop?”
“Yeah. It wouldn’t be the first time, or the worst.”
I laugh. “I’m going to need to hear these stories,” I say. Not that I don’t have a few of my own. Like the time the grocery store clerk asked me if he should be worried about the color of his snot. Then he showed me. It was in a wadded-up tissue.
“So, how did you do?”
“I haven’t done mine yet,” I say.
“Really,” he says, drawing out the word. “Does that mean I’ve won because I did mine already?”
“No. We never said that was part of the rules.”
“Have we even established rules?” he asks.
“We probably should,” I say.
“Well, rules or not, I don’t know how you’re going to beat Mole Lady,” he says.
I scoff. “Of course I will.” I have no idea how I’ll do it, but that competitive feeling is churning in my belly, ready to take on the world. Except it’s cold outside in my world, and I’m wearing fuzzy slippers.
“We’ll see. Gotta go; my next patient’s here.”
We hang up, and a few seconds later my phone dings with a text from Graham. I open it and see it’s a picture of him and a cute, older woman with a gray bob and blue eyes. He’s got his arm around her like they’re best friends, and they’re both smiling.
I get up from the couch. I’ve got some stranger meeting to do.
Graham
I’M A MAN OBSESSED.
Last night Lucy sent me the challenge: learn a new skill. We’re limited on time, since these are daily, so she googled something that would be fairly simple to pick up, and we chose learning to crochet a chain stitch.
Since we’ve turned this into a competition, we’ve established some rules: no external help, and a designated judge, since both of us thought we did the better job yesterday talking to a stranger, and neither of us would relent, so we had to flip a coin. It was heads, which meant the point went to me. Lucy was not happy. She warned me she’s competitive, but so am I.
Lucy did a commendable job with yesterday’s task, though. I’ll admit that now. She struck up a conversation with the butcher at the supermarket, and he ended up hooking her up with some steaks. All I got was a hug from Barbara. And, of course, an offer for some boudoir pictures. So, I guess I got some benefit as well. I would say steak is more my style, but I’ve never tried a boudoir shoot. Not that I’m planning on taking Barabara up on that.
So, to get myself ready for today’s challenge, I watched some YouTube videos this morning, and before heading to work at the spa, I ran to the craft store and bought a crochet hook and some dark-green yarn, with the help of a woman named Linda. She tried to offer me tips, but I turned her down, since we’re not supposed to be getting any help.
I’m a man of my word. Well, new me is. Old me was ... not.
Currently I’m in the on-shift doctor’s office at Aspen Lake General, crocheting yarn into a perfect row. Yes, I’ve done it at least ten times. Yes, it was harder than I expected. Yes, I learned that if you keep working with the same piece of yarn, it will start to fray and make your chains look sloppy.
The crazy part is I kind of like it. I want to learn more and ... I don’t know ... make myself a scarf or something. It could be my new hobby. It’s cathartic, and I feel like it’s given my brain a much-needed break. I’ve been here for four hours and things just now slowed down in the ER.
I hear a knock on my door just before it opens, and Evie peeks her head inside. “Dr. Shackwell—oh, not you too,” she says, her eyes on the crochet hook in my right hand, the chain I’ve been working on in the other.
She opens the door wider, placing a hand on her hip. “What’s going on around here? Why is everyone knitting? I just caught Lucy in the nurses’ station.”
“It’s crocheting, actually. And it’s just Lucy and me.”
She stares at me, her nostrils flaring. “Why?”
“It’s ... a little friendly competition.”
